


Wipe You Clean With Dirty Hands

by Lokesenna



Series: Put Your Hands Into The Fire [2]
Category: Wolverine (Movies), X-Men (Comicverse), X-Men (Movies), X-Men - All Media Types, X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) - Fandom, X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern: No Powers, Anal Sex, M/M, Reunion Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-25
Updated: 2015-08-25
Packaged: 2018-04-17 05:58:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4655229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lokesenna/pseuds/Lokesenna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(This plays at least a year after the happenings in "A Promise Out Of Sight".)</p><p>Logan hadn't expected this, when he stepped into the shabby neighbourhood bar on his way home to his temp quarters in Genosha.</p><p>He hadn't expected to see that long hair flopping, those enthusiastic hands, that sparkling smile. Not here.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wipe You Clean With Dirty Hands

**Author's Note:**

> While this is a rather modern AU without mutant powers, this world is still entirely fictional... please do keep this in mind when reading.

Logan hadn't expected this, when he stepped into the shabby neighbourhood bar on his way home to his temp quarters in Genosha.

He hadn't expected to see that long hair flopping, those enthusiastic hands, that sparkling smile. Not here. Yeah, it was Charles Xavier, somehow escaped from the mansion… and Charles was happy. He was raising a drink and celebrating. In a bar. Again. It was like a flashback. It gave Logan a surprised shiver, to step into this dive of a place and catch sight of the guy again, looking just the same way, just as he had before, one memorable night, back in New York. Back when Logan still had a life.

Logan should have turned around and walked out, right then, right when he saw that it was Victor that Charles was raising his bottle to toast with. Fucking Victor who didn’t belong here, who should have never signed up to be a part of his team. The bottles clashed, and both men drank. It was a dinky, nearly-seedy haven, a known hangout for the military guys and so now also for the personnel from the secret program run from the mansion. The place was nothing special, just a store front in a strip center, with tattered banners outside advertising Wednesday specials on Coronas, and a half-burned-out neon sign that flashed 'Budweiser.' It was on Logan’s direct route to what passed for home these days. Genosha’s finest. When they'd reactivated him for Project W, he'd been given quarters at the air base for the duration, even though no one could say how long that duration would actually be. Open-ended orders were unusual, but not that unusual. It wasn't the first mission Logan had been on that lacked a predictable outcome.

It had only been two weeks since he and Charles had, coincidentally, spent their very first day on this job together, and now, Charles certainly had something to celebrate, and he had certainly given Logan, and the brass, a lot to think about. The geeks and the scientists were, pardon the expression, over the moon now, and so Logan had headed home after a day of excited conferences and phone calls. On his way, he'd caught sight of the Corona banner, and so he'd pulled up to the bar on a whim, not thinking too hard about what he was doing, still floating a little on the science-fiction-becomes-fact nature of what happened at the mansion, still a little bemused. After a day like that, he hadn't been ready to disappear into his soulless room on base and spend another night with the TV. It wasn't that he'd wanted company this evening, exactly. Because if it were that simple, he could get company at the mansion - the non-intrusive cheerful familiar company of the other officers. He even knew a couple of them from before, which was kinda good and kinda bad. In fact he'd already brushed off Victor and Scott this week, when they would have dragged him out with them to play pool and get drunk, no problem, nothing heavy. But Logan hadn't wanted that, not earlier in the week and not now. He didn't want to talk, or socialize, or think, really, but... They were all on the verge of something huge; big changes were on the way, were actually imminent.

Tomorrow they'd brief the brass on Charles' midnight breakthrough, and unless something went very wrong, it was clear even to Logan, who was no expert, that they were very very close, literally one step away, from actually cracking the genetic code that would activate the transporter. Cerebro, Charles had aptly called it, because it was really just a glorified hat. Actually making it work, making it do whatever it did… that was all Charles’ doing. Theories that were way over Logan's head competed on that point, but all were in agreement that Charles had made a breakthrough, even though the very existence of the thing was still a secret from their officially designated golden boy. They were there. This was it.

So, Logan had stopped by the little bar. He'd thought, vaguely, as he climbed out of the truck and went up the sidewalk, that he'd toss back a beer, maybe indulge in a shot or two, maybe watch the last of the play-offs with the other barflies. But instead, he'd run across Charles and Victor.

It was strange and out of character to see them together, which made Logan hesitate after the initial surprise made him stop. He glanced around the room, looking for anyone else from the mansion. Maybe they had come with a group. The bar was smoky and less than half full - after dinner on a week night, with most fans watching the big game at home. Nope; it was just the two of them. He noticed a mall sack with big handles and garish stripes parked next to Charles' barstool.

"Hey, Logan!" Victor had seen him and was waving him over, a grin splitting his face. Logan rolled his eyes. Victor had that same spy sense Logan had - if someone was watching him, he could feel it. It had come in handy back in the day, but now? Logan wished Victor had lost his touch.

He sighed and felt for his cigar and walked on over. Victor ordered him a beer. Charles smiled at him and pushed an ashtray nearer. Logan bowed to the inevitable and lit a smoke and came right up to them and put his elbows on the bar, taking a position that put Charles between him and Victor. He didn't investigate that urge too closely either; the urge to stay next to Charles.

Charles still wore jeans - maybe even the same jeans he'd had on _that night,_ so long ago, but he wasn’t dressed up today. Instead he wore a ratty t-shirt and an even rattier hoodie. He looked like a homeless person. Which he practically was, in fact. Except he had that radiant smile, which was now turned on Logan. No homeless person of Logan’s acquaintance had ever looked that happy… until the man turned away and sneezed into a handkerchief that he yanked from his front pocket.

"How'd you draw the babysitting duty for Wonder Boy?" Logan said to Victor, nudging Charles with an elbow as Charles stuffed away his handkerchief. It was a big old-fashioned square, plain white cotton, like Logan’s granddad used to carry.

"Got the short straw, I guess," Victor returned, still grinning, saluting Charles with his bottle and drinking.

"He insisted I had to look nice for the meeting with the generals tomorrow, and I left most of my things in New York," Charles said. "He took me to the mall and made me buy a new suit jacket." Charles kicked at the sack at his feet.

"And get this, Logan. He bought - wait for it - tweed!" Victor seemed to think this was hilarious. "I couldn't talk him out of it! And believe me, I tried." His laugh was honking, making several people farther down the bar glance their way. Logan shook his head. Charles rolled his eyes.

"Does it have leather patches on the elbows?" Logan asked Charles, a little reluctant to meet the guy's eyes, but going with the flow all the same. They weren't at work. Logan wasn't in uniform. He felt… exposed.

Charles looked affronted. "No, as a matter of fact, it does not," he returned, levelly.

"You know that's a rule," Logan said to Victor, deadpan. "Tweed is like the uniform of the professor. I think they issue tweed jackets with the first master's degree in the arts-and-sciences colleges all across America. But he'll lose points without the elbow patches."

Victor, laughing again, tipped his beer up and drained it. Then he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and brushed by Charles, clapping him on the shoulder. He disappeared around the corner of the bar, presumably heading for the men's room.

Logan took a drag from his cigar and stubbed it out, pocketing it again for later use.

When he looked up, Charles was staring at him, and yet looking a little distant. Logan was pretty sure he knew what Charles was thinking about. Charles tilted his head and his eyes went heavy-lidded… it made Logan inhale and put a hand on his beer, because surely Charles wouldn't do anything; not here. This wasn't New York.

"I wondered if I'd ever get to talk to you alone," Charles said quietly.

Logan focused his glance away from those eyes and onto his beer. The label was getting wet as the condensation seeped along the glass. "Not easy to arrange, given the working conditions." And maybe it was that way on purpose, from Logan’s side of things.

"No. And not easy to arrange, since I had no idea if you'd remember me. Or if you did, whether you might prefer to pretend you didn't."

Logan looked up. Charles had folded his arms… he wasn't gonna lean in, then, or get any closer. That was a tiny tendril of relief.

Logan picked up his beer. "You and me? We didn't have the kind of meeting where you exchange numbers. Addresses. Emails. Agree to send Christmas cards." Logan realized he sounded more bitter than he felt, and took a pull from his bottle to shut himself up.

"I knew that at the time. I thought I made that clear." Charles' look was stern, but not accusing so much as challenging.

"You did," Logan agreed, and then he paused… there was more he wanted to say. Something more. Why? Why did he want to talk to this guy? It wasn’t going to do either of them any good. "I was surprised to see you again," Logan continued, grudgingly. "Very surprised."

For some reason, he didn't want to shut this down, to stop talking… he didn't want Charles to think it was a taboo subject now, but on the other hand, he really had no business standing here letting Charles bring up their previous encounter. It was over and done with, and it had nothing to do with today. It belonged to another part of Logan’s life, a part he always pushed aside when he was in the States and not on a mission… but the way he used to do things, everything he used to know, had blown apart. He'd lost his knack, it seemed, for knowing when to talk, when to run. He'd lost his knack for a lot of things.

Charles said, "Yeah; what were the odds, really?"

Logan nodded. Charles thoughtfully drank some beer. Logan shouldn't be having this conversation. He didn't do this - hook up with guys state side. It was a rule. It was important. At least it used to be… but it was impossible to put his beer down and walk away just now; impossible to throw a demand for Charles to tell Victor goodnight for him over his shoulder, and just leave. He'd made the choice to let Victor wave him over, and here he was. He felt stuck. He watched, riveted, as Charles closed his eyes, let his lips pout around the neck of the bottle. Watched the muscles in his throat as he swallowed, tilting his head back. It made that long dark hair swing, and Logan remembered how it had felt to thread his fingers through it - remembered in a flash of scent and taste and touch. Lingering aroma of yesterday's coffee, and warm sheets, and the kindly soft dark of Charles' bedroom. That night was a good memory, it had been something out of time in Logan’s life. This guy didn't belong, then or now. He had nothing to do with either the military, or the raw howling place that had been Logan’s family. Looking back, with the benefit of hindsight, that night, which came after Pakistan and before... well. That night, as it turned out, had been like a fragile truce. Like the eye of a hurricane.

Charles' soft hands on his skin. Charles' pink mouth on his. Charles, all around him, taking him apart with his sounds and the arch of his spine. Taking him down, to that mindless, volition-less place where there were only feelings and sensations. Nothing else.

Without really meaning to, Logan edged closer to Charles and relit his cigar, for not knowing what else to do with his hands. He blew the smoke over the bar, away from the man at his elbow. Charles went very still.

Logan glanced around; no sign of Victor. Charles glanced around too.

"Look," Charles said. "I won't pretend I wasn't glad to see you, despite the circumstances. I'm well aware of the fact that you can't be interested now, or risk getting interested, ever." He rested his elbows on the bar, cupping his bottle, picking at the label. Logan had to lean farther toward him to hear – or maybe it was just an excuse. "You're very memorable, Logan, but don't worry. I understood back in New York that for whatever reason, you didn't want me to know who you were, and I know that's still true, to a great extent, and I understand why."

"Good," Logan returned. He could smell Charles' shampoo; something subtle and green-scented. "Then I won't have to waste any time explaining it."

Charles looked up and smiled, that flash that came and went as he showed his teeth, bright but somehow not threatening. More tentative, like he almost didn't dare let anyone see it at all. Then the man sighed, as if trying to release some tension. He drained his beer and put it down a little emphatically, before he leaned an elbow on the bar and turned halfway toward Logan. "Let's get out of here. Give Victor some excuse. You can take me home."

"Back to your hotel," Logan clarified, and something started to simmer at the base of his spine. God, it had been a long time since he'd felt anything of the kind. What was it about this guy? His gaze was intense, so blue and so alive. He had amazing eyes.

"Yes. And don't just drop me off, either." Charles held Logan’s gaze, and Logan stared, long and hard. It was so tempting. He remembered how he'd found Charles, by sheer luck, and how that one night had made him forget. Forget everything. That one night.

Charles, with a ghost of a smile, finished, "We do have a lot to celebrate. After all."

Logan said, unsmiling, "Yeah. We do."

*

Charles' hotel room was nothing like the cozy apartment Logan had once gotten a glimpse of. It was a sterile place, barely lived in. A couple of suitcases in a corner, but nothing on the tables or nightstands but the lamps that came with the room. The two double beds were perfectly made, just as the cleaning people had left them. Charles probably hadn't been back here for days. A strip of light seeped between the heavy curtains, the air was a little stale.

"God," Charles said, looking around, after he turned on one of the lamps. "I've just been sleeping at the base. I hardly remember this place."

"Not getting your money's worth of perks, huh. You'll have a pile of money in your account before you know it."

"They have to call out a driver to get me back here, and there's so much to do at the base, so much research… and, the good computers are at the mansion, you know?" Charles had folded his arms and was looking around the room like he was the guest, like it belonged to someone else. He'd left the mall sack standing by the door. Then he took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. "Bloody hell," he whispered.

"Tired?" Logan observed.

"I don't think I've slept for 36 hours. First I was too frustrated, and then, after I figured out the markers, too wired."

"And so, we're back to why I'm here," Logan said, moving over to where the shorter man stood and reached out, because there was no reason to wait, now that they were in Charles' room. He remembered kissing Charles against the door, remembered how it felt when Charles pushed his tongue into Logan’s mouth.

Charles turned to him and smiled, too, a slight raising of one corner of his lips, no more. His glasses were dangling from his hand. Just like before.

Logan, out of habit, out of a long-dormant, half-dead instinct, had intended to reach for his crotch. Old habits of hasty, direct approaches, where the ultimate objective was clear and immediate for both him and his anonymous partner of the moment. But that smile made him change his target. He watched Charles' mouth, and when his fingers touched denim, let his hand slide along Charles's hipbone, around the sideseam of his jeans to press against his back pocket and bring him close. Charles let him, but leaned back a little with his upper body so that he could watch Logan’s face.

Logan frowned a little, and Charles' gaze dropped to his mouth, and then Charles leaned toward him.

Better, Logan thought, and closed his eyes. Warmth, as they pressed their bodies together. Solid warmth, and the scrape of the fronts of their jeans as Charles shifted his weight, not passively waiting for Logan, but not doing the blatant shimmy against his crotch, either. They pressed together, moving their hips just a little, wanting to feel, making contact from thighs all the way up to chest, and then Logan felt the tilting soft press of Charles's lips. Charles' arm curled around his shoulders and Charles opened his mouth, inviting.

Logan stopped thinking entirely after that.

He let Charles kiss him, just stood there and took it, holding him close, and they fumbled at buttons and zippers and about the only thing Logan contributed to the proceedings was to pull down the blankets and bedspread so they could sprawl on the sheets when they were naked, and he did also spare a glance to relocate Charles' glasses safely onto the nightstand between the beds.

After that, there was nothing beyond the overwhelming heat of skin and twining limbs. Wet mouths, and the blooming pleasure and focused warmth that meant a hard-on, meant a repeat of the intensity Logan had experienced before, once, that night in New York.

Amazing, to feel something. Amazing, to want something, anything. To desire.

Charles touched him, and he touched back. For a long time.

"How are we doing this," Charles was whispering, through a blur of kisses, but Logan didn't have an answer, because he hadn't been planning a single thing. He opened his eyes. Charles was above him, his weight a pleasant blanket, and leaning on his elbows, and their dicks were slotted together, gentle wet friction that felt so damn good. Pale fingertips carded over the hairs on Logan’s chest and he exhaled softly in response. Looking made the sensations separate and become distinct again - the sharp damp heat at their groins, the prickling slide of Charles's calf against his, the fading, gentle nips at his neck, along his jaw. His mouth was damp and felt pleasantly bruised and just a little swollen. Logan found he was breathing hard, and that his hands were splayed, one at the geneticist’s ribs, one cupping the side of his ass.

Logan couldn't speak. He shook his head, trying to indicate that anything was fine, that he had no preferences, that Charles could choose, could do whatever, and Charles frowned. The shorter man leaned down and kissed him, and put his arms around Logan and pulled him close before turning them to their sides. He opened Logan’s thighs with his knee, everything as tight and intertwined as they could get it, and Logan decided he didn’t mind that either. Charles… Charles could do whatever he wanted.

Logan kissed him intently, deeply… he was lost already, and lost was where he wanted to be.

"Hey," Charles said, after a long, long kiss, a kiss that left an afterburn of tongue all over the inside of Logan’s mouth, left him breathless. "Are you okay?"

"No," Logan said, because he wasn't, and he immediately said, "Yes," because he was, kind of, and the one thing he couldn't do, wouldn't do, was talk about that. Not now. Not ever. So he rolled them, getting above Charles, ground his hips down, kissing Charles hard and deeply in his turn, like Charles had just kissed him.

Charles closed his eyes and moaned into his mouth, hands scrabbling for purchase on Logan’s back.

Logan lifted his head just enough to speak, his own eyes closed, and said, "Where's the stuff?"

Charles's started, a little. "Oh, shit, I don't have anything. I didn't plan for this. Not this time." A pause, then, “I should have some coconut oil in the bathroom…?”

Logan let go and rolled away and onto the floor between the beds in one quick move. He always had a rubber in his wallet; ages-long habit. He found his crumpled jeans and opened the wallet and threw the little packet on the bed, and got up without a pause and went into the bathroom. Coconut oil may not be the best thing to use, but they could make do… because he really couldn’t care less right now. When he came back, Charles was leaning on an elbow, looking at him, eyebrows up, the rubber between his fingers. Logan didn't give him any more time to think or ask questions. He knew why they were both here; what they both wanted. At least, he knew part of it… and that was more than enough for tonight.

He slid a hand around Charles' neck, fingers in his hair again, and kissed him, slow and deep and careful. He wasn't in a hurry and he wasn't worried or upset. He just wanted to feel and not think. He wanted to fuck and not talk.

Charles melted under his hands, letting Logan take charge the way Logan had been letting him, until just a few minutes ago. The way Logan had let him the first time they'd been together.

Charles kissed him back and arched into his touch as Logan feathered fingertips along that erection he remembered so well. His fingers seemed to remember too. He closed his eyes again and kissed and touched, caressing Charles' cock, cupping and fondling his tight balls, flattening his palm and running it up Charles' hip and over his lower belly, beneath his erection. Charles groaned.

"You had me pegged for a top, back then," Logan whispered, right against his ear, kissing his thick hair, tongueing his sideburn through it. "Don’t mind me fucking you again?"

"God, no… please, do," Charles said, and he grabbed Logan’s head and kissed him, once, hard, and without further ado he flipped himself over, presenting his ass, and reaching back, he slid his hand under Logan’s arm by touch alone, and gripped Logan’s hip, squeezing and encouraging.

Logan chuckled. "Look, I can try a little harder to talk you into it if you need me to."

And Charles laughed, and his hand tightened on Logan’s hip. Logan cracked open the bottle of coconut oil and squeezed out the makeshift lube, coating his fingers and painting Charles. The geneticist was cooperative, saying little encouraging things into his pillow that Logan only partially paid attention to, because the guy had a gorgeous ass, tight and round and muscled, and he was gorgeous inside, too, pushing back against Logan’s fingers, eager and uninhibited and loving this, just as Logan remembered.

Logan rolled the condom down his own, aching cock, along with some of the oil, and then he held on to Charles' hip bones as Charles braced against the bed and eased in. God, he was inside, sheathed in all that melting tightness, and he closed his eyes and let Charles' words and groans encourage him and urge him on, and it was good. So, so good.

The past and the future fell away, and there was only this moment, this man, this bed. Logan buried himself in slick heat as Charles pushed against him, meeting him stroke for stroke. He held back as long as he could, but defeat was certain. It was too good. Too tight. Logan couldn't fight it. He was swept up, carried away on a tide of pleasure. Too soon, he was coming, burying his moans in Charles' hair, pressing his mouth to Charles' nape, holding him close against the jolts of his climax - of both their climaxes, as it turned out, because blindly, on the ebb of his own orgasm, he groped down for Charles' dick and met the man’s hand instead, curled around his fading erection. Logan said, "Mm," and kissed whatever skin of freckled shoulder and nape was convenient, and he stroked and squeezed, easing his fingers between Charles', feeling the spill of his come, enjoying the sliding wetness of it.

"God," Charles said, "too much," and he jerked against Logan a little, closing his hand, protecting his cock from the stimulation Logan wanted to give it. He closed up his fingers, keeping them between Logan’s and his oversensitized skin.

"Sorry," Logan said, backing off and contenting himself with tracing the wetness that was all over the back of Charles's hand, and listening to him breathe as Logan’s own breathing slowed.

"Unngh," Charles said, or something like it, a long relaxed noise. They lay there, still joined, still together, in the half dark.

Logan must have fallen asleep, even though he didn't intend to, because he woke with a start, suddenly aware of hands on his dick. Charles, turned toward him now, was getting the rubber off him.

"Charles," Logan murmured, and he let his hand run along Charles' wrist and up his arm. He could smell the remnants of the coconut oil he'd used for lube, it faintly smelled of Charles, Charles hair… with something green. A sweeter note mixed with the smell of sex. It was dark in the room, dark like night.

And then he was asleep for real.

*

In the hotel parking lot, in the biting chill of dawn, scrubbing the thin layer of frost off his truck's windshield, all Logan was conscious of knowing was a dumb gratitude that Charles hadn't asked any questions, hadn't tried to make him talk.

He didn't have far to drive. Before the sun was fully up, he had gotten through the checkpoint at the base, and then a gallon of coffee and a long hot shower revived him fairly well. At 0900 sharp he was waiting in the conference room at the mansion, listening to the bustle gathering out in the hall.

Charles was late. Victor had chauffeur duty again… but all Logan could think of was how Charles would look in tweed.

**Author's Note:**

> Note: While this is AU, I'm keeping some things from their verse, and giving it another purpose. Cerebro is just one of them... and its purpose will be explained in due time.
> 
> PS: For anyone who's curious, you can find me on tumblr here: [cherikology](http://cherikology.tumblr.com/).


End file.
